What Makes You Different
Kaon. What a horrible place. Birthplace of the rebellion, a subversive force that as of this very moment tears apart the very world it promises to free. Guilty of the selfsame hypocrisy it accused its oppressors of. In their desperate drive to rid the planet of tyrants, they created its greatest one. Ah, the irony! The hopelessness! And tonight, on the dark, pockmarked streets, an agent of the Prime staggers in the shadows. Hoping against hope that he can lie low and remain unseen by the indignant masses--so eager and willing to rip him apart if they had the chance--until the extraction team arrived. Exhausted from a terrible dearth of rest cycles and leaking out of multiple stab and blast wounds, Blurr had only barely managed to escape a covert op during which his cover had been blown. He drags himself into a deserted alleyway--at least he hopes it's deserted, and deposits himself behind a pile of refuse. A faint light flickers dimly from a signpost dangling from a nearby roof...was that a familiar face? Someone he once knew? But what did it matter...? In this particular part of Kaon, unrest was rampant. Of course it was; this wasn't a particularly nice place BEFORE the insanity of Nyon went down. Now? The grumbling was much louder. The Decepticon propaganda went up more and more as a result; posters were everywhere. Posters with a very familiar face. ... Who also happens to just be walking around. Backdrop looks... Shiny. Seriously, he has never been shinier. Some distance behind him, a shadow looms; a body guard? Backdrop looks relatively at peace. Calm. Just... On a walk. His face was everywhere. Someone is coming. Those were definitely footsteps. Slag it. They'll kill him, if they see him. Blurr tries not to move, but a piece of scrap metal scrapes an open wound and he flinches, causing the debris to shift considerably. Fresh fuel leaks out from underneath the pile, sliding into the cracks, seeping into the ground. Backdrop can see it running... Debris? Scattering footsteps? Not altogether uncommon, but maybe someone was hurt. People have been in such a panic, lately...! But it could also be a trap. Backdrop gives a quiet signal for his body guard to hover a bit close -- the imposing rifle mech does just that in complete silence. Like a living shadow. Backdrop found it kind of creepy, really -- before moving in to see what was what. Sure enough, someone -is- definitely hurt. -Very- much so. That part isn't likely to give him pause. But the 'who' of it might come as a shock. Yes, it's Blurr. Former racer, former celebrity--well, all right the celebrity part hasn't -quite- disappeared yet. There were still fans. Probably not any around these parts, though. It's rather ironic, isn't it? Perhaps it strikes Backdrop that Blurr was once the shiny one, with bodyguards and his face all over posters and advertisements. But now he's in the gutters. Just like little old YX used to be.... There's a long and startled pause. "...Blurr? What the slag? What happened to YOU?!" Well, Backdrop isn't trying to murder him, so that's something. Blurr starts and attempts to run, scrambling to his feet quickly. But he is too weak to get very far, and only manages to hoist himself up on a cracked metal crate. He narrows his optics at Backdrop...yeah, he was the one who had been on those signs. So he's a Decepticon now, it seems. "Wh-why...whydoyoucare..." he mumbles, his voice barely audible. "Are... Scrap, you're practically falling apart!" Backdrop actually looks concerned! Shock and awe, really! "Okay, calm down. I'm not gonna do anything, just... What HAPPENED?" "What happened?" Blurr smirks, then winces sharply, doubling over. A mirthless laugh escapes him. "You." "-You- happened. You and your friends. Barely escaped with my life. Just lucky...I-I got away..." His knees buckle just from the effort of standing, and he leans against the wall of the building behind him. "Th-they'll find me...they'll tear me apart..." His optics darken momentarily and he goes limp, only to jerk abruptly back online. "M-maybe I deserve this--! I killed them, those d-disposables...a-allofthem...everylastone...andthenIkilledmore...I couldn't stop..." Is he even talking to Backdrop? Or is he just rambling deliriously? "I-is that what I was supposed to be, a killer?! Not a racer, but a killer, a sparkless killer?!" For a few seconds, Backdrop stares at Blurr. He doesn't say anything for a while. "You know... For a long time, I really wanted you dead." A deep sigh. "But Swivel really had hope for you. She said you were messed up and hurt and did things because of being messed up. And if Swivel thought you had something good in you... Maybe you do." With that, Backdrop looks around, frowning a little. "What, so Decepticons beat you up? Wonder if I can find something to take your markings off. Could pass you in as a Nyon survivor..." "M-maybe...maybe it would have been better that way." Blurr murmurs. What way? The being dead way. "W-wait no, not all of them died, one of them had something, nine-three-nine. Nine-three-nine, they couldn't have killed him. He had the prototype, the -working- one, they would have wanted to keep it running as long as possible--!" "You never saw him, did you?!" The Autobot stares at Backdrop, as if expecting some sort of revelation. "He was j-just a cleaner...m-maybe they just put him back out on the streets with a different frame..." he shakes his head. "S-swivel..." He recognizes the name. "Shecared...abouth-him...I miss her." There's a deep sigh; Backdrop frowns at the rambling about his former self. "...Yeah. I miss her, too. Don't ask me where she went, though. Haven't seen her in... A long time." He gives Blurr a pat. "Oh. Hmm." The little racer mech then heads to a wall. "This might work. It's not gonna remove anything, but might cover it up..." Then, he's pouring a bucket of... Something. On Blurr. It's black and sticky and smells pretty bad. "Youdidn'tanswer...thequestion...939...you'veseenhiskind..." Blurr mumbles, as a black, sticky substance is poured over him. It reeks, but he doesn't exactly have the strength to resist. He glances down at the mess, then looks back up at Backdrop, appearing slightly more lucid this time. "Why are you helping me, you're a Decepticon. And I'm....the enemy. You hate me…" "Not even almost that simple anymore." Backdrop sighs. "Swivel genuinely liked you. I'm doing this for her, okay? I don't... I don't even hate you, really." A pause. "...As for... YX-939... The YX are all gone. There aren't any more left." Blurr peers at Backdrop curiously. "If you don't hate me, then why are you with the Autobot hate club?" he asks. A simple question, with a complex answer most likely. Backdrop stares at Blurr as if he had suddenly grown two heads. "Nyon." "Then you hate me." Blurr says dismissively, turning away. "And I don't want your help, because you must surely be manipulating me for the sake of whatever agenda you have up your tailpipes." "Oh, for the love of... Will you stop being an idiot for just one minute?" Backdrop lets out a huff. "Come on. You're covered in muck. With any luck, no one will recognize you until we're somewhere where you can make a call." With that, Backdrop physically lifts Blurr up to lean against him. It's a bit tricky; he's quite a bit shorter than Blurr is. "No!" Blurr attempts to push him away. "If you weren't going to manipulate me, then you would have killed me already, like the -rest- of them were trying to do!" he insists. "What makes you different, Backdrop? Different from the others? Why would you be, if you swore your oaths of allegiance to Megatron? I serve his opponent, his hated enemy. Everything I stand for is everything you hate. N-nyon, the Omega Destructors....the vamparc ribbon...control over life itself..." What exactly is he trying to accomplish? It's not very clear, to say the least. "You are making almost no sense. I think you got hit on the head a little too hard." Backdrop somehow keeps clinging to Blurr; he even manages to drag him along a bit. "It's not as SIMPLE as what side we're on. I was talking to an Autobot femme just this morning who was thinking of switching sides because of Nyon. It's not like you personally voted for wrecking an entire city...!" "No b-but I...it's not as if I'm not guilty of the same sort of wholesale slaughter..." Blurr admits. He finally stops struggling, and eventually stasis locks from fuel loss. Now just look at Backdrop. Saving the very person he once wanted dead. Hopefully none of the other Decepticons catch wind of their 'poster child' helping Zeta Prime by making sure one of his soldiers, and a very uniquely talented one at that, lives to see another cycle. There'd most likely be quite a few people with whom that would not sit well at all.